Horse crazy

March 31, 2007

Recently I’ve begun taking on private art students again after a long period of not teaching. It is incredibly stimulating to my own art; I’ve rediscovered the delight of drawing simply for the joy of it. My Friday afternoon student is 10 years old and horse crazy, as I was at that age. We discovered that here in Holland, she had the Dutch version of Walter T. Foster’s, ‘How to draw Horses’ book. It was the same one I had as a child, and it was one of the few books I rescued from our old house in Pittsburgh after my father died. So I showed it to her and we had fun looking at the similarities and telling each other which horses we’d already drawn!

One of the things I enjoy about her in regards to her art is that she is fearless. She tackles each new drawing with the assurance that she can do it. Through her, I see how years of ‘being an artist’ can sometimes be the worst thing for one’s art-I mean one’s real, close-to-the-bone and soul art. The art that has nothing to do with galleries, trends, or superficial identity. I am reminded that being oneself is sometimes the most important ingredient in making art because it produces something authentic.